Today's car of the day is CM's 1992 Nissan Pulsar GTI-R.
The Nissan Pulsar GTI-R (chassis code RNN14 - aka GTiR, i-R and 'R) is a homologated 2 litre turbo-charged AWD vehicle manufactured by Nissan in Japan between 1990 and 1994 in order to enter the WRC under Group A rules. The body is based on the Nissan Pulsar (aka Sunny) N14 3-door hatchback model, but distinguished by the large rear wing and bonnet scoop. It has an ATTESA 4WD system (also used on some U12 & U13 Bluebird models), and a unique variant (coded 54C) of the SR20DET engine (not used on any other car).
For more information and pictures of the real car please visit: Nissan Pulsar GTI-R
A recent addition from diecastdingo (thanks Patrick!) this racer ran the Rallye Automobile de Monte Carlo in 1992.
After producing the minimum required 5,000 examples (500 of them being homologation models), Nissan entered the GTI-R under Group A rules in the FIA WRC as a factory team (Nissan Motorsport Europe - NME) in 1991 & 1992.
Based in Milton Keynes, NME only competed in selected rallies during both years (ones they thought had the highest potential for good results), but the initial success expected by Nissan Japan was not forthcoming, and they abandoned the campaign in 1992 after only 9 rallies. Factory development stopped there, and the GTI-R never won a WRC Group A rally. Nissan redirected funding to Le Mans and the development of the R390, and NME moved to the FWD Sunny GTI in the WRC F2 category (A7 class) where they had better success with Alister McRae winning the 1995 BRC. Much has been written about the reason for the GTI-R Group-A failure. The most notable being the uncompetitive Dunlop tyres, the inefficiency of the top-mounted intercooler when engine power was increased to Group A standards (especially in hot weather), and the political and cultural issues between Nissan Japan and the newly created NME (Nissan Motorsport Europe).
Fantastic model of a very interesting car. I suppose the antenna shouldn't look like that, right?
ReplyDeleteYou are quite correct! I've made the correction to the real model. I'm going to attempt to edit the corrected pics into the above entry.
ReplyDeleteIt looked odd to me too, but I thought that it might have been a roof-mounted spotlight of some sort. In my defense, the only reference picture I could find for the car was this one:
http://hongwell.netfirms.com/html/cm_s_rally__car_collection_129.html